Wednesday, April 5, 2017

mercy, not merit

Grace. God’s
Grace. It seems grace is most needed and
best understood in the middle of pain,
sin, suffering, and brokenness. Part of the world today is all about gaining and earning and power and worthiness
and deserving.Deserve what? Absolutely
nothing. Nothing at all... Yet, God...

When we accept
Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we recognize we need His grace and love and are
accepting of what He offers because we were in a helpless condition before.But, we can’t continue to live in a helpless
state, totally dependent on God’s grace to cover our lives.

The remaining
paragraphs were found in part and in whole on several different websites:

A shorthand for what grace is - “mercy, not merit.”
which is all about getting what you deserve. Grace is getting what you don’t
deserve, and not getting what
you do deserve. Christianity teaches that what we deserve is death with no hope
of resurrection.

While everyone desperately needs it, grace is not
about us. Grace is fundamentally a word about
God: His un-coerced initiative and pervasive, extravagant demonstrations of
care and favor. Michael Horton writes, “In
grace, God gives nothing less than Himself. Grace, then, is not a third thing
or substance mediating between God and sinners, but is Jesus Christ in
redeeming action.”

Christians
live every day by the grace of God. We receive forgiveness according to the
riches of God’s grace, and grace drives our sanctification. Spiritual growth
doesn’t happen overnight; we “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ” Grace transforms our desires, motivations, and behavior.